What: Moving to End Sexual Assault's sixth Brave Bold and Beautiful: A celebration of survivors and MESA's 40 years of service to the community

When: 6:30-9:30 p.m. Nov. 8

Where: Hotel Boulderado, 2115 13th St., Boulder.

Includes: Appetizers, drinks, entertainment, silent auction and program featuring survivor Annabelle Kindig Miglia, talking about her memoir, "Footsteps Out of Darkness." In 1972, two 11-year-old girls were abducted and brutally raped in Boulder County, according to MESA. One girl was killed, and the other survived. Miglia is the survivor, and her story moved the community to develop MESA. In addition, Chris Sansone will share his story, and Janine D'Anniballe will receive the Brave, Bold and Beautiful 2012 award for her decade of service as executive director.

Looking back, the story he wrote as a second-grader makes sense. Painfully so.

A puppy dog was yipping for help, and yipping and yipping. But no one ever came. So he quit. The dog became silent.

"That's exactly the portrait of me," says David Jensen, now a University of Colorado graduate, "eventually freezing to the point of just taking the abuse."

In a way, he froze his own memory, too -- for survival, he says. Jensen says his first clear memory of being sexually abused by his father hit him one day when he was walking home from a support group for family members of alcoholics. He was 26. He says it slapped him like a sudden series of snapshots that left him spinning, nauseous and, honestly, pretty freaked out.

Because "real men" aren't supposed to be victims -- much less of something sexual, he says. You either shut up and bear it, or you wanted it and liked it, especially if it's an older woman; that's the message that society echoes. A real man can protect himself. Men can't be raped. The myths around male sexual abuse compound the initial perpetration, Jensen says.

That's why so many men who were sexually abused hide in silence and shame.

But recent highly publicized cases, such as the scandal in which longtime Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky was sentenced this week to at least 30 years in prison on 45 counts of child sexual abuse, are encouraging more open discussion, some say. In fact, in the 1990s, the Wings Foundation offered only one Colorado support group for male survivors of sexual abuse. Today, it's nearing 30 groups -- 14 new groups in the past year alone. The Boulder Wings group has doubled in size in the past year, says Jensen.

He is a board chairman for the foundation and was a participant Colorado's first men's group. Today, he regularly shares his story publicly and openly, in hopes of encouraging other men to seek help and healing.

He says he never pressed charges because he wasn't able to patch together the slivers of memories until several years after his father died, a common scenario with suppressed memories.

"Sex abuse permeates every area of someone's life, from self-esteem to how comfortable you are with your sexuality, to your work. But people are wanting to heal," Jensen says. "I think, as people continue to come forward and say, 'I'm not healed 100 percent but I'm working on it, and my life is better than it's ever been,' that gives someone else hope."

Boulder psychotherapist Daniel Blausey, working on one of his bird people paintings, tries to set an example for male survivors of sexual abuse by creating art that reflects his personal and professional experiences. (Cliff Grassmick/Daily Camera)

Still, he can think of only a handful of male survivors in Colorado who are vocal advocates.

Compare this to the statistics: One in six boys have at least one unwanted or abusive sexual experience before age 16, according to MaleSurvivor, a nonprofit organization that aims to prevent and heal the sexual victimization of boys and men. Experts believe this estimate is low.

In addition to the growing support groups, the University of Colorado's Gay Lesbian Bisexual Transgender Queer (GLBTQ) Resource Center organized a summer screening of the documentary "Boys and Men Healing" in conjunction with a panel of survivors for an event called MaleSurvivor's Dare to Dream 2. The event was designed to educate the community about male sexual abuse, connect survivors to resources and help break their isolation.

Earlier this month, the Wings Foundation celebrated its 30th anniversary, featuring a testimony by former Miss America Marilyn Van Derbur and her husband, Larry Atler.

In November, Moving to End Sexual Assault is celebrating its 40th year of service in Boulder County, and one of the speakers will be a male survivor, Chris Sansone.

Some men don't seek help until their 50s or after retirement, according to Daniel Blausey, an art therapist and psychotherapist who specializes in childhood sexual abuse at Boulder-based Studio Blue.

He wants people to know: "Boys are abused. In astonishingly shocking numbers." The form of that abuse and the individual's response to it varies, but the common denominator is there is an age or power difference.

Blausey began working with male survivors in college. He was one of the few male art therapists, so his placements as a social work student were often in helping other men. Today, he helps male survivors process and externalize their experiences through traditional therapy and making art.

"Literally, a picture is worth 1,000 words," he says. "A lot of times, survivors keep it hidden and down, and the art is a way to distance themselves outside and observe it, without being overwhelmed."

This is especially helpful for men who have been told all their lives that the only acceptable release for their pain is anger and aggression.

Sometimes the art sparks a memory -- good or bad. Some men smother every inch of the paper with paint. Some draw sanctuaries, a place in their mind where they can go to feel safe.

For one man, that was the scene of a beach with a lifeguard chair. It was night, with twinkling stars. He was no artist, yet the scene was beautiful, Blausey remembers. It also represented the man's isolation and distance.

"Based on his upbringing, it wouldn't have been OK for him to say that, but once he drew it, it was a huge breakthrough, and then he was able to verbalize it more," Blausey says.

On the wall in his studio hangs many pictures that he has painted himself. The art reflects his personal and professional experiences, he says.

"Up in Arms" portrays a fist raised toward the sky, empowered, yet the wrist is cut, in self-harm; many people try to manage their pain in such a way, or through drinking too much, overeating or drugs.

"Bird Man" intends to give a face to his clients' pain, "the male experience," he says.

He hopes his clients look at "Self Baptism" and understand (in a nonreligious context) that "your body is a temple, and you can cleanse it, and then it's clean, and you can move on," Blausey says.

"Still, there is a lot of pain expressed in the body, in figure and faith," he says, describing the painting. "But that pain is the beginning -- not the end."

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